We need an alternative to pro-big business Labour

Alex Sampson, Plymouth Socialist Party

CPI inflation, contrary to the government’s predictions, rose to 3.6% in June. CPI inflation doesn’t include housing costs, RPI, which does take that into account, topped 4.4% in the same period. The rise was driven not by increases in holidays or one-off purchases but by food and fuel – the things we need to get by. Simultaneously, unemployment figures have risen to 4.7% – the highest level since 2021. Businesses have blamed job losses on increases in National Insurance and minimum wage costs as well as market uncertainties, as the world capitalist system becomes more chaotic.

The one certainty we can see in these figures is that Labour’s policies are failing the working class, as we’re expected to pay the price for the bosses’ crisis. While ministers boast about how their minimum wage increases are helping workers, the reality is that most working-class families are seeing their council tax, bills and cost of weekly shops rising faster than their wages. The ‘difficult decisions’ the government refers to continues to mean eating or paying bills for working-class families, something completely alien to the Westminster set with their £94,000 salaries, plus expenses and lucrative second jobs.

Labour excuses

Labour’s excuses that it is ‘cleaning up the mess the previous government left’ are not cutting it. We have heard it all before. What workers see is that they still cannot afford to feed their families. They see their parents or grandparents going cold due to the loss of their winter fuel allowance, their disabled friends and family are terrified of losing their PIP and disability allowance, and now they see that their children with special education needs and disabilities are the next targets.

Birmingham bin workers are fighting for their jobs, resident doctors look set to strike in August to redress pay cuts over the last decade and a half, and Unite the Union has started discussing its relationship to the Labour Party. More and more people aren’t accepting Labour’s weak excuses and are fighting back against the capitalist-friendly government.

We need a new workers’ party that will fight for interests of the working class, not the greedy businesses that sacrifice workers for profit. That’s why it’s so important that trade unionists discuss how we can take steps for a new party for our class.